Puppet
by Anne Bowman
Summary: There's a centuries-old invisible monster hanging around, but it's mostly about how nobody knows how to get or keep what they want.
1. I

AN: I know I don't own them. You know I know I don't own them. I know you know I know I don't own them. And so forth and so on. This story is PG13 for language and contains elements of Carey/Molly, Clu/Fi, Jack/Clu, and Fi/Carey, just so you know.   


_what is that look upon your face;  
a simple mood, or have I fallen from grace?  
don't you tell me nothing is wrong--for just how long should this be going on?  
is the sky too grey, did your milk taste bad today?  
did I fail in bed, was it something I have said?  
was it something I have said?_

There is nothing quite as sorrowful as the specific moment when a lovely evening is ruined. The flame flickers and then simply dies beneath the force of the elements conspiring against it, and camaraderie turns to resentment and love inspires anger and fear. Nothing ever seems to just stay the way it should. This was an unfortunate phenomenon with which Molly Phillips was quite familiar, and this particular lovely evening was destined to flicker out like scores of lovely evenings before it. They had simply been existing in the same space, sharing a comfortable silence, broken only by his chord-progression practice and the sound of the pages of the book she was half-reading sliding against each other in well-worn grooves.

_here we go on and on again, the same old game  
of me to blame, of me to blame  
here I go jumping round your bed; oh, stupid me  
'cause you're the king, and I'm your puppet on a string.  
is it so hard to understand?  
the situation's getting out of hand_

She noticed that he hadn't strummed a note in quite a while and turned to look and see what the source of the sudden quiet could be. He was simply looking at her, watching her read, examining her almost clinically and with an alarming amount of adoration, and it made her quite uncomfortable. 

"What?" There was a shade too much irritation in her voice, and the hurt was clearly evident as an instant of confusion flashed behind his eyes, which quickly became sadness, then contemplation, then frustration. And there it was, the moment, the turning point.

"What is it with you?" he finally asked. "It's like I _annoy_ you. It feels like every five seconds you're snapping at me for saying or doing something. What have I done to you?"

"I just don't need all that attention," she said defensively. "And, you know, it does bother me when you seem to be getting too... attached."

"Why?" She didn't speak. He choked the syllable out again.

Finally, quietly: "You know this can't last. It's a secret that can never be told. Eventually, and possibly soon, your parents will start to suspect you're doing something terrible behind their backs, which you kind of are, because you haven't gone on a date in months. Now, don't get me wrong. I love this. I love you. But I'm okay with the fact that this is going to have to end sometime. I've always been okay with that, and when you... do things that show me you're not okay with that, it just bothers me. I don't want to see you get hurt when this ends." She had tried to put it gently, but it was clear that the attempt had failed.

_did I drive you mad, am I wearing the wrong hat?  
tell me what to do; should I paint the grey sky blue?  
the grey sky blue... I wish I could look into your head and read your thoughts   
but so instead, but so instead here we go on and on again  
the same old game, where you're the king   
and I'm your puppet on a string_

"What have I done?" He laid her borrowed guitar down on the bed and stood up in a desperate play to force control of the conversation into his own hands instead of hers. "What is it? What have I done to turn you against me?"

"What are you talking about? Weren't you listening?"

"So you're telling me that this isn't new, that you went into this from the start with the idea that when it started to get difficult or complicated, you could just abort, close up shop."

"Well... come on, Carey. Be reasonable. It's obvious now, it was obvious then."

"To you. Because you don't take me seriously. I'm still a child, to you. You don't think I know enough about love for my 'attachment' to you to be anything more than an infatuation."

"Come on, you know that isn't true," she said, aware that he had changed direction; now she was the defendant, he was the accuser. 

"Then what is it? Is it him? Are you pushing me away on purpose because of him?"

"No, of course not."

"So if it's not about me, and it's not about him, what is it about? Are you just so intent on being unhappy that you can't stand it when something really great happens to you?"

_should I leave or stay?  
should I kiss your blues away?  
tell me what to do; I'd do anything for you   
yes, anything, 'cause I'm yours..._

She closed the open book on her lap and stood up, bracing herself for the inevitable. There was only one way this argument could end. "Look, it's really sweet that you think you love me, but you really don't know what you're getting into. I'm not what you need, or even what you really want. You deserve better."

"I don't think that's up to you."

"I was hoping this wouldn't happen, not now, not so soon," she said, approaching him, placing her hand on his face, preparing herself, preparing him.

"What are you doing?" It was difficult to tell whether that was anger shaking his voice or if he was about to cry. She hoped it wasn't the latter.

"You've got to go now." She gave him a sad smile and he pulled away from her, backing toward the door.

_just like a puppet on a string,   
you're keeping me just hanging on; now hear my song  
just like a puppet on a string,  
can't you see you're killing me?  
in this game, you always win   
and I'm your puppet on a string_

"Stop it," he said in that same scary tone. "Don't do this to me. Don't do this to yourself. You don't have to. We can just forget this entire conversation." Now he was nearly pleading, though he knew it was futile and it showed.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I hoped it wouldn't end this way."

He just stood there, staring at her, trying to burn the image of her face into his memory, sorry he had taken such opportunities for granted in the past. When she didn't make a move to stop him, he turned and did as he was told, slamming the door behind him, hard.


	2. II

One thing never changed about Molly over the years: once she had what she wanted, she never wanted it again. It was an unfortunate cycle, since Rick died, and in the relationships she'd had before him, too. It wasn't that her fickle nature manifested itself during the relationship; no, it was when it ended, an event that was always instigated by her own nagging desire for freedom, but more than that, the consuming need to reject before she was rejected. This thing with Carey was no different. She heard his tires crunch the driveway gravel viciously as he backed out, driving too fast, too angry to be sensible. She had won, yet she had never been quite so miserable at this particular moment than she was when faced with the knowledge that he would not be returning tonight, nor tomorrow, nor, possibly, ever again.

Carey had accused her of needing to sabotage her own happiness, and perhaps to an extent that was true, she recognized, but... well, what did it matter now? She succeeded. He was gone. Time to give up and move on. It never would have worked out anyway. She knew that. She could never have admitted what she had done to Irene and Ned, or to her own children, and he would have said it was because she didn't respect him enough, didn't value the relationship enough, didn't have the courage to stand up for what she wanted, and fuck the world if they didn't like it. She would have smiled at his youthful enthusiasm and said something patronizing about how he couldn't possibly understand what it was like for her, and then she would have gotten that dreadful wounded look again, and so forth, and so on. But he hadn't actually ever said any of those things. He had accepted her need to keep him a secret, never pushed, never complained. Since this thing had started, she had been seized by fear almost constantly, taking drastic measures to make sure they absolutely would not be discovered. And why? It was a question only she could answer, and she couldn't answer it. 

He would have been willing to do or say anything to make her happy, and all she could do was push and struggle against perceved suffocation. It was an aspect of her personality that she really hated, particularly right now. Maybe he had been right. Maybe it was all about her own mental imbalance. But it didn't matter. It was over. She had struck out with her weapons, her words and her glances, and he had faced the monsters in her head willingly, martyring himself out of love for the insatiable demon he could have slayed. And he would not return to be killed again.

After a few hours of maudlin self-flagellation and introspection, she couldn't take it anymore. She filled up the bathtub and removed a razor blade from a brand-new package in the medicine cabinet, determined to put an end to the monster for once and for all, to martyr herself out of love for the poor, dead would-be monster slayer and those before him and those that would inevitably, unsuspectingly fall into the same trap down the line. But death seemed like an unsuitable punishment for a simple argument, for the same routine she'd played out dozens of times before this night, the same routine that would be played out dozens of times after this night. He was just another... boy? She had to laugh. Maybe he was right. Maybe she didn't give him enough respect. But she couldn't call him a man, exactly. Just another dead slayer, then. Just a boy. Thinking of him as inconsequential did help, though she knew it would be difficult to keep up the mental charade for very long, because clearly he wasn't inconsequential. Maybe not the great love of her life, but maybe... this line of thought was interrupted by a ringing telephone, a jarring sound in the middle of the night. 

She hesitated to answer, but took the plunge by the third ring. "Hello?" she said cautiously.

And not since Rick died had she received such unwelcome information over the telephone, which was immediately thrown across the room in a desperate attempt to convince herself that all of this had to be a dream. But the phone smashed into the wall and broke into a convincing number of pieces on the floor. No time to cry. Just time to get dressed and go.

At the sound of the phone's collision with the wall, Jack awoke and rushed down the hall, pushing through the open door. "What's going on?"

"It's Fiona, and Clu. Something terrible has happened. Get dressed. I'm leaving in three minutes," she said, re-assuming the no-nonsense mother role, a mechanical comfort.


	3. III

"We were just driving," Fiona explained weakly, not desiring to give out the full details regarding just where they had been, what they had been doing, and why they had been together alone, not right now, not when there were more important issues to be discussed. "And the car stopped going forward. The engine was running, Clu's foot was on the gas, but we couldn't move forward. By the time it occurred to him to try going in reverse, or to stop the car, it was too late. We found ourselves in the ditch, tossed out of the car, like we were little dolls or something."

Here she choked up a little. Jack squeezed Fi's hand encouragingly, urging her to continue.

"So we tried to get up, though we were both a little confused about just what had happened, since not five minutes before we had been driving along normally, everything was fine. First it took him. It dragged him away from me, into the trees, into the dark, until I couldn't see him anymore. I screamed for him, I tried to hold on, but it was determined. I could hear him screaming and I stood out in the middle of the road, waiting for a car to come by, waiting for somebody to help, but there was nothing. And then everything was just... quiet."

"Fiona, honey, what 'it,' what are you talking about?" Molly asked with more than a little concern.

"I... I don't know. There were hands, fingers, claws, we could feel them. It had legs, because of the way it moved. But there was literally nothing there that you could see."

"Maybe it was too dark," suggested Jack.

"The car's headlights were still on. If it had been human, we would have been able to see it just fine," she retorted defensively.

"It could be related to amnesia," Molly said. "Selective amnesia, that kind of thing. Sometimes it affects victims so they can't remember their attackers... I've read about that."

"I don't have amnesia." Fi was beginning to get angry. "This is not the time for you to not believe me." Now she was near tears again. 

It was silent in the hospital room except for the steady beep of the machines until Jack spoke up, albeit quietly: "What happened then, after you couldn't hear Clu anymore?"

"Then it took me. I don't remember much. I must have hit my head on something while it was dragging me away from the car. I woke up in the woods, next to Clu, positioned exactly the same way, when the police showed up with their flashlights, shining them in my eyes."

Molly blinked back her anger and said, "We're going to find out who--"

"What."

"What?"

"Not who. What."

She sighed, then decided to humor Fi instead of arguing at this particular point in time. "We're going to find out what did this to the two of you. You're just lucky neither of you were seriously hurt, beyond relatively minor blood loss and bruises the doctor assures me aren't as bad as they look." She glanced at Fi cautiously and tried not to wince as obviously as she had when she had first entered the room, offering a weak smile.

"Gee, thanks, Mom," Fi joked, trying to break the tension, but neither Molly nor Jack was in the mood to laugh, being driven by the same homicidal urge to track down the mysterious attacker as quickly as possible and having absolutely no idea where to begin. They left quickly when ushered out by the stern nurse. 

In the hallway, Molly gave a consoling hug to Ned and Irene as she and Jack headed home for the slim remainder of the evening. Once they did arrive home, neither bothered to turn on the lights, so they sat in the slowly brightening living room, shell-shocked. Finally Jack said: "Clearly they weren't attacked by some kind of invisible monster."

"No, clearly not."

"But I have to admit that thing about the car was pretty bizarre."

"Yep."

"So it's not entirely impossible that it was something... you know, weird."

"No."

"So if that's true, maybe the first place to look is where Fi always goes first to find information."

"The laptop."

"Yeah."


	4. IV

They had retrieved Fi's computer and set it up by the time either realized they had really not the first idea how to start looking. They were usually the skeptics to whom she presented her results, which were usually summarily dismissed on the grounds that they were implausible, crazy, silly, downright insane. But it was a place to start. Once the implausible had been ruled out, all that would be left was the plausible. Right?

Molly took the first crack; Fi's "Life is so weird" site was also her browser's home page, so that was lucky. She typed hesitantly into the search engine, as she had seen Fi do on occasion: Invisibility. "How to turn yourself invisible, invisible dead pets, the secret of invisible ink... yeah, that isn't going to do it." She got up and presented the laptop to Jack. "Your turn."

"So what is it that's invisible? A ghost?" he asked. 

"I don't think a ghost would have claws," Molly pointed out seriously.

"A monster, then."

"Monsters live under your bed and in your closet." And in your head, perhaps. "Try... 'demon.'"

"Okay, invisible demon it is." Searching. Searching. Searching........

"Here's something," he said, and she bent down to examine his results. "I mean, it's insane, but it's something."

This is what he found: 

"Drac is described as an enormous and lizard like monster who is more than just a monster. It is a evil sorcerer and a demon. It is naked as a worm, willowy as a lamprey, with two fins of transparent blue lace on his back, webbed feet like the flamingo of the Camargue, and long greenish hair which floated like algae on the waves. Aside from the power of shapeshifting, The Drac also can make himself invisible.

"The Drac has a taste for human flesh and blood. He lures a young new mother to his underwater home to nurse Drac's frail child. She does this for seven years, made to forget her life as a human being. After rubbing the magic balm made from human fat and water cresses which enables the Drac to be invisible on the Drac child's eyes (her nightly responsibility), the woman sometimes forgets to wash her hands and gains the ability to see the true form of the Drac when he is in disguise or invisible. When the woman is released back home, everything in the past seven years is made like a dream to her. When next the Drac comes in town and is spotted by the woman, this powerful sorcerer casts a spell so that the woman loses her ability to spot Drac. This is the story told by the woman." 

"What the hell is a lamprey?" Molly wondered aloud.

"That's just crazy, though. Right?"

"Of course it is. But, you know, so is a car stopping and being tossed into a ditch by... something. I mean, it wasn't the wind."

"I just..."

"I don't want to believe it either," she said wearily. "But at this point, what else is there? The police didn't find any evidence of any other person near the site of the accident. No other footprints anywhere."

"So we're going with the Drac."

"We're going with the Drac. But now where are we supposed to go with it?"

"The library?" 

"Research with books? How old-fashioned."

"I've found they're more reliable," he said. "Think it's open yet?"

It wasn't, so they waited. Three hours. In the car, silently, neither wanting to articulate their respective thoughts, Molly's regarding just why her family was such a magnet for awful, unbelievable events like this, and Jack's regarding, among other things, just why Fiona and Clu had been out in such a desolate place alone in the middle of the night to begin with.

They searched through books of demon folklore and dragon tales all morning, and were just about to give up when he found exactly what they had been looking for: an expanded version of the Drac's story as well as a clue as to how to defeat it. It was assumed that no one could really kill the monster, since it had survived for centuries, but its effect and attraction to certain victims could be deterred by utilizing a simple ritual described in just one of the dozens of books they had gone through. 

The book described the events that occurred after the woman told her story to the villagers: they captured and tortured the Drac, under her watch, for kidnapping her, stealing her child's mother, her husband's wife. This went on for weeks until the woman could take no more of it, sympathizing too strongly with the plight of the creature whose fate she was responsible for. She waited until the villagers had abandoned him one evening and set him loose. He killed her immediately, then went after his torturers. After justice had been meted out, he returned to his home to find that his child had also been killed as a result of the woman's story. Since that discovery, the Drac is said to have become a recluse, never leaving his home, building his strength and plotting his revenge, for hundreds of years. And now he seeks out victims who are plagued by anger or fear, the two attributes that led to the demise of both his son and the woman he loved, and attempts to cleanse them. 

So the ritual for repelling him is really quite simple. All that's required is an absence of anger and fear. Not many people are able to present that to him, so his list of victims since his emergence from his home is a hundred miles long. Clu and Fi, lost together in the middle of the night, were sitting ducks. 

What, Jack wondered, were they so afraid of?

Molly knew the answer to that, though she didn't share it with him. (Being discovered, obviously.)

They made photocopies of the relevant pages and set out for the hospital with a battle plan in mind: they would obtain the exact location of the attack and search there, serving as monster bait. Would it even be possible to kill the demon now, after so many years? If it was possible, how on earth could they possibly be the appropriate people for the task? And what if the demon had followed his victims in search of new flesh and blood to sustain him?

They tried not to think about the possibilities. 


	5. V

AN: I possibly should have pointed out earlier in this story that the story of the Drac is essentially true. I made up everything beyond the woman losing her ability to see him. If it wasn't true, I probably wouldn't have given the monster such a dorky name. :)

----

Irene greeted them at the hospital, looking absolutely ravaged. 

"What is it?" Molly began to panic.

"It's Ned."

"What about him?"

"He went out there... he wanted to see if he could find some kind of clue about who did this to Clu, and to Fi, and he was attacked. He fought back even though he couldn't see who it was that was attacking _him_, and... it's worse. Much worse than the kids." Irene broke down and Molly offered her a shoulder, gesturing behind Irene's back for Jack to go inside.

He tried Clu's room first, but decided not to disturb his sleep. His bruises and injuries seemed worse than Fi's, so it was difficult to look at him. He closed the door quietly, feeling the protective rage swell up in him again; he entered Fi's room with a renewed determination.

Fi was wide awake, drumming her fingers on the edge of the bed in an irritating pattern. "Hey," he said, trying to smile. "Feeling any better?"

"Not much. How's Clu?"

"Don't know. He's sleeping now." He handed her the photocopies from the library, and she paged through them eagerly, glad to finally have something to do other than stare at the ceiling. "We think you were attacked by a monster called The Drac."

"You do?" She looked up from the paper in surprise. "I mean, you think that?"

"I don't know what to think. It's impossible, right? Except stranger things have happened to us over the last couple of years, so maybe... maybe the most out-there, illogical answer is the right one. I don't know. I think we just need to have something to blame, something to go after. You know?"

"Yeah," she smiled. "I know." She scanned the pages and handed them back to him. "That's great. You found that stuff?"

"Yeah, Mom and I, we went on your computer..." At her look of outrage, he raised his hands in a surrendering fashion and added quickly, "We didn't look at anything private, we just looked up some possibilities on the web, and then we went to the library and found the rest of it."

"In books?"

"Yeah, in books."

"Well, I'm impressed," she said approvingly. 

"Did you hear about Ned?"

"No, did something happen to him?"

"Apparently he was attacked by the same thing that got you two. Speaking of you two," he segued awkwardly, "um... just what were you doing out there alone last night?"

"Just driving around, you know, stuff," she answered evasively, looking around the room. 

"Are you two... together, or something, now?"

"Well," she said and stopped abruptly as Molly entered the room with a brave smile. 

"Okay, did he show you the information from the library?" she asked, all business.

"Yes. I think this is definitely a possibility."

"Good. Well, then, I got the exact location of Ned's attack from Irene, so I guess we'll check in on Clu and then be on our way."

"Oh, he's sleeping. He doesn't look any better today," Jack filled her in.

"Wait, wait, wait. You guys are going after this thing?"

Neither Molly nor Jack answered. 

"You can't _do _that. What if it gets you? What if it kills you?"

"Don't worry, honey. We're well-prepared." Molly hugged her gingerly and pulled away. "I know there are risks, but if we don't put a stop to it, what happens tomorrow? Or next week? We've read the books. We know what to do."

"Mom, don't," Fi pleaded, but Molly and Jack made their good-byes and left her alone with a thousand morbid endings dancing in her head until the nurse administered a sedative, after which there was nothing to think about at all...


	6. VI

"You're doing _what_?" Irene was as alarmed by the announcement as Fi had been. Molly and Jack didn't bother to clarify their intentions, instead continuing their search through the Phillips house for potentially useful items.

"Salt?" asked Jack, holding up a container of Morton's. "I heard if you make a circle around you, or something, you're immune from attack."

"Can't hurt," Molly shrugged, rummaging through cabinets and closets. "Toss it in the bag." 

"You can't do that," Irene persisted. "What if you get hurt? Then what happens?"

"Then we join our friends in the hospital, or we die for a good cause," Molly finally said, more than a little frustrated. "Look, we can't just sit around here going, 'gee, I wish we knew what happened out there.' This thing, whatever it is, went after the people we love. There's a very strong protection instinct that kicks in when a member of your family is nearly killed, Irene, and frankly, I'm surprised you're trying to stop us instead of help us."

"This is foolish. You'll probably just make things worse. Please don't go out there."

"Ooh, look, honey, a little axe." Molly held up a small red-handled hammer for Jack's approval. He nodded, and she tossed it into the ever-fuller supply bag.

There was a tentative knock at the door, and then the screen banged open as Carey let himself in. Surprised by the increasing amount of desperate-search clutter, he let out a low whistle. "What's going on?"

"Molly and Jack are intent on killing themselves tonight," Irene said. "They're going out to fight some crazed killer with a little axe and some salt."

"Count me in."

Molly stopped rummaging for a moment and looked up. "No."

"No?"

"No."

"I have just as much right to go out there and get myself killed as you do."

"No, you don't. You need to stay inside and the two of you need to stay safe. Lock your doors and windows, don't drive your car. We think whatever this is--and it's clearly _not _a crazed killer, because nobody's dead yet--might follow its victims in search of more."

"Rope?" Jack suggested, and she nodded shortly.

"That's bullshit," Carey said. "I'm not going to sit around here while you go out there and confront whoever it is that's tried to kill my father and two of my best friends."

She paused. "That's understandable, and it's certainly laudable, but the answer is still no."

"Okay, I think the bag's full enough now," Jack said, dragging the duffel bag toward the front door. "Ready to go?"


	7. VII

Carey and Irene sat in the backseat of Molly's car with the duffel bag across both of their laps. 

"I still don't know why you insisted on coming," Molly glanced in the rearview mirror. "We really do have this under control. We read the books and everything."

"The books?"

"Yeah," Jack admitted reluctantly. "We, uh, we think that the mystery attacker is actually a centuries-old demon with the power to turn itself invisible."

"I knew it," Irene said. "I knew both of you had gone crazy."

"Come on, after everything we've been through? It isn't completely impossible," Molly pointed out.

"Yes. It is."

Jack intervened. "Well, the main thing is, if we're right and we are looking for the Drac, it's important to remember that he feeds on anger and fear. It went after Clu and Fi because they were afraid. Ned was angry. So if you're going to come with us--"

"Which they _aren't_," interjected Molly.

"--then you'll have to really try to be as detached as possible. I think it's the only way to really be safe around this thing. That and the deterrent spell from the demon book might be our only defenses against it." He handed Irene an extra copy of the spell.

"Right," Irene snorted. She refused to look at the folded paper; Carey pocketed it instead.

They were silent until Molly pulled the car off the road at the appropriate spot, parking on the shoulder. She and Jack armed themselves with flashlights from the duffel bag and issued a last instruction to Irene and Carey. "Just stay here. Please," Molly said. "You'll only put us in more danger if you come."

"We're coming," Carey insisted, locking eyes with her, refusing to back down. Finally she relented and turned to Jack. "What if you and Irene stay here, in case it's tracking victims on the road? Clu and Fi were interrupted while they were driving. Maybe that's where it starts looking for food."

"No, no, no, I'm staying with--" Jack tried to protest. 

"You'll be of more help this way," Molly told him gently, and began to pull items from the bag. "You keep the salt and your rosary and all this other stuff. I'll take the axe, the garlic, the cross, and the big knife--just in case--along with my copy of the deterrent spell." Jack appeared to sulk. 

"If anything happens..." he started.

"If anything happens, you know I love you. We'll all be fine," she assured him, hugging him tightly. "Let's go," she ordered in a colder tone to Carey, who said his own goodbye to Irene, and then followed Molly into the dark forest, shining weak flashlight beams suspiciously, carefully, down potential paths. She led the way, armed with her knife and cross, focused on the task at hand. "Remember," she reminded him, "stay detached."

"Right," he said shortly. 

That was the last word spoken for a good hour or two. They walked and walked and walked in circles around the wooded area, trying to keep track of the road. The only forest sounds were animals and wind; no signs of any recent attacks, no screams from other parts of the forest, no footsteps behind them, just their own breathing and the treading of dead leaves.

"This isn't doing any good," he finally spoke up.

"It's better than sitting at home waiting for it to attack someone else," she replied tightly.

"Is it? You feel like you're doing something, but all you're doing is running around blindly, hoping to run into something eventually."

"If you think it's such a bad idea, why did you insist on coming along?" The leaves crunched beneath their feet as she pointed her light in a different direction and took off determinedly. 

"You know why." 

"I told you to stop that."

"You don't just stop loving a person. You accept that the person has qualities that sometimes make it hard for you to love them, but you don't just stop," he said. 

"What do I have to do, then, huh? What can I do that's terrible enough to make you stop this?"

"Why do we have to stop this?"

"Because it's never going to be anything serious, because it would kill everyone we know if they found out, because it's insane!"

"It is not insane," he protested. "You're just afraid."

"Afraid?" she stopped plowing forward and turned to face him. "I am not afraid. I'm practical."

"You're afraid of saying what it is you really want because you think you'll lose it. So you pretend you don't want it so when you lose it, you don't have to feel bad later. Well, look at me, Molly, it's not working! I'm still here!"

"What the fuck do you know about what I want?"

"More than you do, apparently."

"Oh, you've got a clever little answer for everything, don't you? Well, you're not as perceptive as you think you are."

"Then tell me I'm wrong, tell me you aren't in love with me."

"You're wrong."

"I don't believe you."

"That isn't my problem," she retorted, and began walking again. "Do you really think now is the best time to talk about this?"

"Look, I get that because of Rick you're probably not into the idea of--"

And then it happened. They heard Irene scream and the sound of a body being dragged through leaves. Molly broke into a run toward the sound, and Carey followed after her, shouting for her to stop, to wait, to think about what she was doing first. She didn't heed his advice, instead throwing the cross into the trees and wrapping both hands around the handle of the axe. There it was: Jack was clearly being clutched by something, lifted into the air. He stared at it and took a deep breath, then another, then another, trying to calm himself down. The creature seemed to pause, and after a few tense moments, it dropped him. 

Crunch, crunch. Perhaps it was turning toward them now. They squinted in the dark, shined their lights in its direction, but there was nothing out there. It took Carey first, lifting him into the air. He tried the same calming technique that seemed to have worked for Jack, but nothing happened. Molly closed her eyes and swung the axe, connecting with something that roared in pain. She opened her eyes as the Drac tossed Carey into a tree, like Fi had described, like a rag doll. Presumably its attentions were focused on her now. She lifted the axe again and brought it down hard, and was rewarded with another ear-shattering howl. She attacked again and again, but the monster did not retreat; she could hear its breath, ragged and indignant now. It was waiting for an opportunity to strike back. And it did; she felt sharp claws digging into her sides, pressing her back against the trunk of a tree. Its talons were prepared to pierce her, and she thought she could sense its relief that feeding could finally begin. 

Then: "Baratum, melbido, asiridium," Carey choked out weakly. Jack, though powerless to move, joined in, and they continued to chant the rest of the deterrent spell as the monster's wounded howl grew louder. Finally it dropped her, and heavy footsteps retreated quickly into the forest. Clearly, they had not defeated the monster after all; from the looks of it when Irene arrived, armed with her cell phone and flanked by paramedics, it had defeated them.


	8. VIII

It was a few days later by the time Molly came to in the hospital. She awoke to see Fi, her bruises fading nicely, standing over her with a worried look. "I told you not to go," Fi reminded her sternly as soon as Molly's eyes fluttered open, but she couldn't conceal the look of unabashed relief that washed over her face, and smiled. "I can't believe you went out there to act as bait for some mythical creature you probably don't even believe in."

"You'd be surprised," Molly said, realizing too late that speaking would be the source of excruciating pain. Fi saw her wince and rushed forward. Despite Molly's nonverbal protestations, Fi ran to find a nurse. Molly leaned back against her pillow in an attempt to rest, but couldn't help trying to feel her new wounds with her eyes closed; she was sure the sight would be unbearable. All she found were bandages. (And the sight _would _have been unbearable; to her doctor's utter puzzlement, there were four enormous crescent-shaped claw marks on the right and left sides of her torso, not to mention the heavy patches of bruising that darkened areas of her shoulders, back, and neck.) 

She sighed and half-growled in frustration, annoyed that her pursuit of the monster had been derailed by their inability to consider eveything that would be necessary during the confrontation beforehand. If they had only found a definitive answer to how to kill it, instead of merely making it scamper away with a few generally inconsequential wounds, she could relax and recover naturally. But the knowledge that this thing was still out there, while she and now almost everyone in the world that she cared about had been essentially defeated by it, made her fidget constantly and push the doctor into signing for her release as soon as possible. It took five more days for her perceived captors to finally relent and set her free, let her back out on the streets. 

This time, she would arm herself with a specific mission: not merely to discover and harm the monster, but to kill it.

But no matter how valiantly she tried to pretend that her wounds weren't really that bad, or that they didn't still send shockwaves of pain through her entire body every time she walked, spoke, or moved, it was fairly obvious to everyone that some sort of intervention needed to be staged to keep Molly from going right back out there and getting herself hurt again, or killed. 

Ned remained in the hospital, as he was the only one of the monster's recent victims with actual broken bones; Irene stayed with him day and night now that Clu, Fi, Jack, Carey, and Molly had been released. Jack and Carey's stay had been the shortest of all--compared to the others, their damage was relatively inconsequential.

While Molly slaved away in the library, searching for any type of permanent demon death spell that might work, Jack and Clu sat in the car, waiting. Jack had offered to help, as he had done before, but she was evidently determined to fight the monster alone now, after almost losing Jack. Of course, the prospect of Molly succeeding and running off to the demon's lair or whatever to get herself killed wasn't exactly attractive to Jack either, but he figured he would let her do what she needed to do until the point at which it would inevitably become dangerous.

"So," Clu said. "Your mom's pretty serious about this, huh?"

"Yep."

"And we can't help her?"

"I think this is something she needs to do alone."

"Hm."

The silence between them now was intolerably awkward. Finally Clu spoke again: "I should probably explain what was going on that night."

"You don't have to explain anything," said Jack.

"Yeah, I do."

"No, you don't, and I'd rather that you didn't, if you don't mind."

"I don't care if you want to hear it, I want to tell you. Yes, we were on a date. Yes, some things were happening that a girl's brother should never hear about."

Jack bit his lip and looked toward the library, pleading with somebody to give him psychic powers to he could mentally order Molly to come outside _right now. _But he didn't actually believe in psychic powers, so Molly remained, stubbornly, inside and Jack remained very much in the same unenviable position he had never actually left. "Look, I understand," he offered as a method of making peace and ending the conversation, although he didn't actually understand and was in fact quite outraged by Clu's admission.

"No, you don't. I... I thought she'd be like you, only we'd have something that I didn't have to hide."

Jack rolled his eyes and began chanting in his head: Mom, come out. Come out, mom.

"She isn't like you. She's totally different. And it's great, what she is, she's really great. I love her."

Where's that goddamn monster now?

"But she isn't you." 

Now Jack was confused, though he tried not to let on. Clu plowed on, burrowing deeper into his own hole, the bed he'd made for himself: "You're so different. I love you both. I can't possibly choose between you." He tried to catch Jack's eye and failed. "I don't know what to do now."

Jack opened and closed his mouth a few times, thinking of possible replies but sucking them back in at the last second. By the time he'd finally formulated one he almost felt confident enough to actually articulate, his prayer was finally answered a little too late. Molly knocked on the window, waving a stack of papers with unadulterated glee. He sighed and got out of the car to help her climb into the backseat. Clu didn't bother to acknowledge her or the discovery she was telling them about; he just stared out his own window, cursing the world. 


	9. IX

Jack and Clu dropped Molly off at the house to peruse her discoveries further under the supervision of Carey and Fi. They, it appeared, had promised Irene they would pick up some unnamed but necessary object and return it to her at the hospital. After Jack offered this weak explanation, they hastily drove away in Molly's car. 

"Well, that was odd," Molly noted, but the excitement of finding the material she had found quickly overcame her again and she reclined in her own bed, studying every word of the new death spell, memorizing it to the best of her ability. This one wasn't like the deterrent spell, either--there were supplies to be gathered. She hated this feeling of physical powerlessness; it made her feel like an old lady for the first time, which didn't improve her disposition at all.

After making sure Molly was settled, Fi headed downstairs, where Carey was sitting, alone, in the silent living room. She pursed her lips and shook her head. "What is with you? I mean, we're all worried about your dad and the monster and everything, but... I don't know. It feels like you've been really distant. You barely even came to the hospital when Clu and me were there."

"I'm sorry," he said genuinely, but offered no further explanation.

Fi contemplated the situation for a moment, and developed a theory. She almost didn't articulate it; the idea seemed absurd. Of course, some of her reluctance to think about this particular theory had to do with her own personal ideas regarding Carey and the most suitable mate for him: namely, her. Her brief dalliance with Clu had really been a sort of test, to see if one brother would be the same as another. He wasn't. He was sweet, but he wasn't the same. Now the theory became a monster in her own mind, screeching and struggling for her to set it free; she had to rule out the possibility. 

"It was her, wasn't it?" she finally said, more as a statement than a question, hoping that he would look at her quizzically and inquire, "Her who?"

He looked taken aback and her stomach sank. How could it be true? Out of all the weird possibilities she had embraced over the years, this was the one out-there idea she never believed would actually be true. 

"Yes." 

Her worst fears had been confirmed. She tried to keep the mental pictures and implications out of her head. Thinking about pink elephants now, yes, pink flying elephants, hmm, and their little frog friends, doing an Indian rain dance. 

"I'm sorry," he offered, oblivious to the images of little green war-painted frogs riding giant pink blobs through the sky desperately running through her head. "I'm sorry that I let it interfere with my concern for you and Clu. I should have been more mature than that. I just didn't want to face her, I didn't want to acknowledge that something had really happened to you, I didn't want to think about any of it."

"It's, um, it's okay, because I understand."

"Do you?"

"Well, no, and frankly, I think it's more than a little bit gross."

He just shook his head and looked away from her. "But," she continued. "What I think isn't actually the point, is it?"

"What do you mean?"

"I think the point is," she said carefully, "that no matter what I happen to think of this... situation, it's something _you _have to deal with, and I'll support you no matter what you do."

"That's really sweet, Fi. Thanks."

She smiled and got up to leave. "Sure, no problem." He really didn't have a clue, did he? She was heading back up the stairs when he spoke again: "Fi."

"Yeah?" she said, a little too quickly, turning around.

"I'm sorry. I know that it's going to be hard on you, and on Jack if he finds out, but especially you because I know... I mean, I've felt... there's something, isn't there?"

"Yeah," she admitted. "Something."

He finally rose to join her on the stairs, placing both of his hands on her shoulders. Despite her revulsion and confusion and anger and sadness, she found herself feeling that same old thrill at the moment his hands connected with her body. Stop it, she warned her imagination. Just shut up. "I'm sorry," he said again. "It just isn't meant to be. I'm not sure how this happened, but it did, and, well..."

Fi tried not to let the disappointment show when she finally spoke up. "Do you love her?"

He paused. "Yeah, you know, I really do. Despite everything. Maybe because of it."

"Then that's all that matters," she said wisely, giving him a brave smile. "Don't you think?"

"Thanks, Fi." He pulled her into a hug and she tried not to hold on to the warmth of his body against hers, the smell of his light cologne mixed with a heavy amount of soap, the way his skin felt pressed against her; she tried to mind that he was squeezing a little too hard, flaring up her uncured joint aches, but she couldn't bring herself to object. She really just wanted to keep this moment forever, but she knew it was impossible, and when he finally pulled away and looked into her eyes, she knew that it wasn't her he had been thinking about at all. 

She couldn't let him see how deeply she had felt that something; she wouldn't. But she needed to get away from him, to have some time to think about all of this, to be out of his presence, and she definitely didn't want to see Molly right now.

But there she was, standing at the top of the stairs, dressed, armed with a small backpack and grasping her photocopies. "Damn. I thought I could get out of here without anyone interfering."

"Well, you can't," Fi piped up. "Go on, get back in there. We're under strict orders from Irene and the police to keep you away from where you want to go. So come on," she ordered authoritiatively, heading up the stairs toward Molly, intent on using force if necessary to keep her from killing herself--although at the moment, she acknowledged, her concern for Molly's welfare wasn't quite as true-hearted as a daughter's concern for her mother should be. Still, she was a responsible girl, so she ignored the evil whispers in her ear and stood directly in front of Molly, who glanced at Fi, then back at Carey, then at her again. She rolled her eyes. 

"Fine," she said. "You're right. Why should I want to rip this thing to pieces after it tried to kill my children, my friends, and me? I'm being totally irrational." She spun on her heel and slammed the bedroom door behind her. 

"Well, clearly the pain medication is not doing wonders for her personality," Fi noted with more than a little amusement.

"I should probably go," he said. "I'm probably making her worse."

Fi considered this for a moment, and then willed herself the strength to ignore the screaming in her head, her ears, her heart, her stomach, her veins. "No."

"No?"

"You should stay. You have to talk to her now. She needs you to tell her that she doesn't have to do this. We're all okay. We'll all be okay. I think she needs you now," she repeated, kicking herself.

"You're okay with that?"

"No," she replied honestly. "But like I said, right now it doesn't matter what I think. Later, you better believe it's gonna matter. But not tonight. Not until this is over." She smiled at him sadly and retreated to her own room, locking the door behind her. Though he couldn't see her do it, she locked her window too, just in case the evil inner-Fi voices got the best of her...


	10. X

He knocked lightly on Molly's door, then tried turning the knob, but it wouldn't give. "Molly?" No answer. He knocked again, harder this time. Nothing. He pressed into the door with his less-injured shoulder and finally it swung open to reveal... nothing. The window was open; Molly was gone. "What did she do, climb down?" He looked out the window suspiciously, but there was no sign of anyone limping away in the vicinity. Jack and Clu were sitting in her car in the driveway, so the possibility that she had secretly left was pretty slim. 

"Something isn't right," he murmured, a master of the obvious. He surveyed the room again. Her backpack was in the corner, lying pathetically on its back with its straps clawing the air helplessly, where she had no doubt thrown it in a fit of pique after being denied in the hallway. The photocopies were strewn around the bed, some scattered on the floor around it. 

"Fi!" he shouted, and sprinted down the hallway to her door. She met him in her doorway, looking uncharacteristically weary. 

"Yeah?"

"She's gone."

"What do you mean, she's gone?" He grabbed her by the arm and led her into Molly's room. He gestured around wildly with his good hand. 

"Look!"

"Did she actually climb down?"

"I don't think so. Look, her stuff's still here." He tossed the backpack onto the bed and began gathering up the scattered copies. Fi didn't respond, instead roaming around and inspecting the details of the room; she pressed her fingers against the windowsill. "Claws," she whispered.

Jack and Clu were not pleased to be interrupted by Fi and Carey climbing into the backseat uninvited. 

"Hey," Jack said indignantly, "we were--" 

"Drive," Fi commanded, rummaging through the backpack. He knew better than to argue.

They pulled off the road in the same general spot where Molly had stopped a week before. Fi distributed the supplies--a flashlight to Jack, photocopies to Carey and Clu, the backpack and the rest of its potentially lethal contents for herself. She dictated a plan: everybody spread out.

An hour had passed, and Fi was growing tired of traipsing around the forest, yelling occasionally for her mother, looking for something no one could even prove existed. She wasn't in the mood to be the paranormal's lone champion tonight; all she wanted was to go back home and resume feeling sorry for herself at once. She was pursuing this pitiful line of thought when she nearly ran into Jack. 

"Hey! Watch it," he warned. "Aren't you supposed to be, you know, looking for something?"

"I have been," retorted Fi. "But there's nothing there. Did you find anything?"

"No."

"We can't stop looking."

"Let's go this way," he said, shining his flashlight into the trees and heading off in a different direction. She had to run to keep up with him. 

"Slow down!"

"Keep up!"

"Jack!"

He stopped and turned to face her. "What?" he demanded. 

"I just... you know, slow down. I can't keep up when you walk that fast," she finished lamely. What was wrong with him? Did he blame her for losing Molly? "You know, you can't blame me for this. Who could have predicted that--"

"No, nothing's ever your fault, is it? Everything happens _to _you."

Fi's brow furrowed. "What is that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing. Never mind. Nothing. Come on." He started to walk away again, not slowing down a bit. She ran to catch up with him and grabbed his arm. He shook her off angrily and stopped. "What the hell did you think you were doing?" He pointed the flashlight at her face and she raised her hands to ward off the light.

"I was just... I was upset about something, so I went into my room for, like, three minutes. That's it."

"That's not what I'm talking about." He switched off the light.

"Then what _are _you talking about?"

"Don't act like you don't know."

"Oh. He told you, too?"

"What do you mean, 'too'? Yes, he told me everything. All about you."

"About me?"

"About what you were doing out here that night."

"Oh. Him. That." She blushed and pretended to look around in the backpack with as much nonchalance as she could muster. "So?"

"What I don't get is why you did it."

"Since when are you an abstinence freak? And why is it any of your business anyway?"

"Because you're my sister, and he's my best friend, and I love him."

"Well, of course you love him, everybody loves Clu, he's a great guy, what do you think, I'm going to--"

"No. Not like that." 

She arched an eyebrow as this revelation sunk in. "Oh. So you..."

"Yes."

"Well. That's interesting. Are you sure he's interest--"

"Yes," he cut her off again.

"It's just that he seemed awfully--"

"But, he's in love with you."

"Oh, Jack, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean for that to happen."

"What does that mean?"

"Well, I don't love him. And if I had known... I would have been shocked, and, um, very surprised, but I definitely wouldn't have done what we did."

"Why don't you love him?"

"Because... I was interested in someone else, and he wasn't interested in me. And there was Clu, such a great friend, always ready, always happy. So I suggested that we take a drive. And we got lost, and some things happened that apparently shouldn't have. But that's all it ever was."

"Oh." He turned around and started walking slowly again. 

"I'm sorry he doesn't love you," she offered softly.

"Oh, no, he does. Apparently he loves us both."

"Well, _that's _a little gross," she said, wrinkling her nose. "Although I've heard grosser things than that tonight, I guess."

"What?"

"Nothing."

They walked along silently for a while, occasionally and futilely shouting for Molly. Neither of them were surprised nor overjoyed to see Clu bounding toward them. "Finally!" he exclaimed.

"What, did you find her?" 

"Oh, no. It's just really boring walking around out here by myself. I was starting to go a little crazy."

"No offense," Fi smirked, laying a hand on his shoulder, "but I think you already were a little crazy."

He smiled adoringly at her and Jack's formerly clearing expression darkened to sulkiness again as he charged forward. "He's upset," Fi told Clu confidentially. "You should go talk to him." He gave her another adoring smile and ran to catch up with Jack. She shook her head and kept walking slowly behind them, listening hard both to their conversation and the surrounding forest noises in case the monster was in range. He wasn't, and she soon found that their conversation wasn't something she wanted to listen to either, so she stealthily headed off in a different direction after noticing a few decimated tree stumps and some tree trunks that looked as if they had been forcibly pushed to the side by something very large and very strong. Of course, it could have just been their natural formation, but she figured any lead was a good lead, especially considering the alternative. Was it everyone's mission to freak her out today?


	11. XI

"Dude," Clu sighed, walking slightly ahead of Jack down a path that was particularly dark and difficult to navigate. "I just don't know what to do."

Jack grunted in response, shuffling his feet. Clu speeded up a little, remembering his childhood fear of the dark. "I mean," he continued, "I just wish things could go back to the way they were before all this started. Back when I knew it and you knew it and we didn't have to _talk_ about it all the time or think about what's gonna happen if somebody finds us out. You know?"

No answer. He glanced back in Jack's direction. No Jack. "Hey, come on," he complained. "I don't care if you're mad at me, you don't just walk away from somebody who's trying to, like, talk seriously with you. Because it's rude. Where are you?" He looked in each direction. No sign of anything but trees and more trees. 

He kept walking, figuring that Jack would catch up with him eventually, because he was just irresistible like that. Then it occurred to him, a thought so strange and perfect that he had to say it aloud to the trees and whatever real or imagined monsters might be lurking in them: "Did I get my wish?" What if his wish had come true, and Jack was somewhere safe like home, and it was really a month ago, and none of this had even happened? Wait. If _that_ was true, then that meant Clu was out here in the woods, in the dark, totally alone, with no idea how to get home. 

He decided to keep walking. Jack would catch up. Without anyone to talk to, his thoughts eventually wandered back to the reason he was stuck out here in the first place, and he began yelling for Molly. It was awkward. He wasn't sure what to call her. If she had been caught by that monster thing, she probably wouldn't care if he called her Molly, but it seemed kind of rude. Then again, "Mrs. Phillips" took longer to say. He settled on "Mrs. P," and shouted it once in a while as he worked his way through the labyrinth of bark and leaves and twigs. 

It seemed like it had been quite a while since Jack had walked off, and there was no sign of Molly anywhere, or anyone else, for that matter. He decided to stop and let them find him. Clearly, they were all somewhere together without him. And his legs, which were already sore, had begun to ache miserably. He could almost hear them whining: We want to go home. Take us home. Aloud he said, "Me too, man." He sat down on the trunk of a conveniently nearby fallen tree and settled in for the wait. 

Fi was also trying to outpace her traveling companion. Carey wasn't trying to talk to her, but it was very weird to be alone with one of your best friends who also happened to be your mother's boyfriend and she found that idea particularly unpleasant at the moment. She walked faster, yelling for Molly, and getting no response. The second he opened his mouth to speak instead of shout, she cringed. No, no, no. I do not want to be having this conversation.

"Hey, Fi?"

She grunted. Like brother, like sister.

"Could you walk a little slower? My side is starting to hurt."

"Don't you want to find her?" she challenged testily.

"We're not getting anywhere anyway," he said, stopping. "Come on, slow down. Rest."

"I don't want to be out here any longer than I have to."

"You're upset about earlier, right?"

"So young, yet so perceptive. I see why she likes you." She could have been more civil, she supposed, but she was tired and her legs hurt and she was kind of justified anyway. 

He sighed. "Even if it weirds you out, can't you just chill out until we find her?"

"I feel like crap, Carey. I'm not in the mood to be nice." She took off again, yelling. "Mom!"

"Fi?" The voice wasn't Carey's. 

"Mom?" She kept walking, with Carey in tow, toward a shape on the ground. 

"Are you crazy, walking around out here in the middle of the night?" 

"What happened? Are you okay?" She knelt beside Molly and helped her into a sitting position. Carey hung back, though he wsa obviously relieved.

"Yeah, mostly. A little beat up, but nothing too serious." She winced.

"What happened?" Fi repeated.

"Well, it brought me out here and was prepared to, you know," Molly explained, gesturing. "And I just decided to let everything go. I made peace with everything. I made peace with your father being gone, with you and Jack being so independent, with the fact that I can't have what I want. And that was it."

"What?"

"It just dropped me here. I guess the fall knocked me out for a while. I don't know where it went."

"It doesn't matter," Fi said decisively. "We need to get out of here before it comes back."

They heard a small, tinny scream come from somewhere within the woods. It was Fi's turn to sigh. "You two stay here. I've got your stuff. I'll go find Jack and Clu." 

Before anyone could register an objection, Fi was gone. 


	12. XII

"Well, screw that," said Molly, climbing a little more slowly than she had intended to her feet. She headed off in the same direction as Fi, leaving Carey standing alone. He weighed the options and, after a moment, followed her. He trailed after her for a while before speaking up.   
  
"Look, on the off chance that Fi does find Jack and Clu, don't you think we should stay where she thinks we are?"  
  
"You can go back," she offered without slowing down.  
  
"That's not what I meant."  
  
"Okay."  
  
"I meant that we should both go back, because for one thing, this is pointless, and for another thing, you're already hurt, so what good is it going to do anybody if we do find them anyway? You don't even have that stuff you brought."  
  
She stopped and turned toward him. "I'm not letting my children get eaten by that thing. I don't care what I have to do to stop that from happening. I don't care if I'm already hurt or if I don't have some stupid words that made it go away a hundred years ago."  
  
"I understand that," he said gently. "But I really don't think there's anything you can do for them right now. We probably wouldn't even be able to find them."  
  
"If you don't want to come along, I understand, and it really is fine."  
  
"Why don't you let me go?"  
  
"And sit out here alone worrying for hours and with no way to know if everyone else is dead or hurt?"  
  
"Well, I don't want to do that either."  
  
"So let's stop talking about it and get going."  
  
"Come on," he said, making a final attempt to reason with her. "Let it go. They're old enough to protect themselves. I know you want to help them, but there really isn't anything you can do right now."  
  
She just shook her head and headed off again. He didn't follow, instead letting out a generic grunt of utter frustration. "You are impossible," he called after her. "Completely stubborn. Totally unreasonable." No response, but she did pause. He took this opportunity to offer a few more frustrated complaints. "If there's a wall to run into, you'll find it. And God knows you could never just relax for five minutes without stressing out over something, whether it's real or just in your head."  
  
Molly turned back again and headed toward him. He backed off but continued to speak: "Not to mention that you're dead set on being unhappy."  
  
"Do you really think right now is the best time to have this conversation?" she asked in a tone of voice that was barely audible, narrowing her eyes. "Aren't you concerned about Clu? Or Jack? Or Fi?"  
  
"Of course I am. But there's nothing we can do for them. Trust Fi."  
  
"Well, go on, then. What else?" She continued to advance as he continued to back toward the spot where Fi had left them.   
  
"You're so afraid that everyone's going to leave you that you do everything you can to make them go away so at least it can be your choice instead of theirs." And then there was silence. Carey stopped walking as his back abruptly met the trunk of a tree. She drew closer until there was almost no space between them. Frankly, as crazy as she had been acting lately, he was beginning to get a little scared and regretted some of what he had said in his attempt to bring her back here. So he was surprised when, instead of arguing or attacking him, she simply laid her head on his chest and sighed. He could feel the words more than he could hear them when she apologized, and after a moment he wrapped his arms around her gingerly. They stood like that for a minute or two until she passed out, probably from pain or exhaustion. He carefully laid her out on the ground and sat at the base of his tree, just waiting. And listening.  
  
Meanwhile, Jack had heard that scream too, from his resting position. He had tired of Clu's persistent discussion of their whatever-it-was, and decided to stop for a while. The nap had lasted longer than he'd expected, and he was easing out of sleep when the scream, much louder and closer to him than it was to the others, snapped him awake. It was just one wild noise in the night that faded even more quickly than it had begun. A short burst, and then silence. He took off running in the direction he had left Clu wandering down, but found nothing. He paused to breathe and heard another voice: "Jack! Clu! Hello?" Fi could barely make out her brother's shape in the dark, but when she did, she raced toward him. "It wasn't you!" She hugged him so tight it nearly cut off his circulation. "Where's Clu? Weren't you together?"  
  
"No. It's a long story. I have no idea where he is."  
  
As if on cue, Clu screamed again, louder and longer this time. Fi took off running toward the sound, hastily grabbing the relevant items from Molly's bag, and was shocked to be met by a much stronger force propelling her backward and up, up, up. Without thinking, she shrieked and kicked, lashing out, dropping most of the contents of Molly's pack onto the ground below, where a dazed Clu was being helped to his feet by Jack. Something swiped Jack off of his own feet and knocked him flat on the ground, unconscious. Clu quickly gathered the scattered items and yelled up to Fi: "Stay calm! Tell me what to do with this stuff!"  
  
"I, I don't know," she sputtered, her normally sharp mind having completely deserted her for the moment.  
  
"It's important that you stay calm," Clu repeated in an even tone of voice, even as he panicked. He glanced over the materials Molly had copied, but, being unable to make heads nor tails of the spell-casting gibberish, he decided to make use of his superior intellect and devised a clever plan for dispatching the invisible monster. It involved first taking the little red emergency mini-axe and slashing in the general vicinity of the monster's tail. He lashed out futilely a few times before striking tail flesh, at which point the monster began to bleed. As the blood streamed from the fresh wound, it made other parts of the monster's body more visible. He worked quickly, figuring the monster would take little notice of what was going on with its tail, continuing to hack until the tail, almost completely visible at this point, was barely hanging on to the monster's body. He closed his eyes in anticipation of disgust and brought the axe down once more, severing the tail from the body once and for all. That, the monster did notice. It yowled and reached to mournfully touch the stump that had once been connected to the tail, which lay lifelessly and disconnected among the fallen leaves.   
  
Fi fell to the ground with a resounding thump and Clu rushed to her side, shaking her roughly. "Come on!" he whispered urgently. "We have to get out of here now!" She grunted and began to get up. He did the same to Jack until the latter woke up. The three of them limped away as quickly as possible, not looking back.   
  
The monster let out one more mournful howl and the swift, vehement flapping of wings could be heard for miles.   
  
  



	13. XIII

7 days later.  
  
Irene knocked out a few short raps on the back door before letting herself in, carrying a fully-stocked paper bag in one arm and swinging the door open with the other. She glanced back at the porch for a minute before stepping over the threshold, leaving the door just slightly ajar. Molly glanced up from the apple she was slicing and offered a small smile as Irene set the bag down on the table and pulled up a chair.   
  
"I can't thank you enough. I know you've got so much on your hands with Ned and the boys," said Molly.  
  
Irene leaned over and pulled an apple from the bowl in front of Molly and began idly peeling it with her fingernails. "I'm glad for the break, frankly," she said.   
  
"How's Ned doing?"  
  
"He's fine, physically, but you know him. He obsesses. He'll get over it. You feeling better?"  
  
"Yeah, I am," Molly admitted, as if it surprised even her.  
  
"How are the kids?"  
  
"Well, I think Fi's glad to have an excuse to sit in her room and type for hours without interruption. And Jack's had constant medical attention since we've all been home."  
  
"Chelsea and Rhonda? I wonder if one of them ever goes anywhere without the other one. Is there a Chelsea without a Rhonda?"  
  
"I don't know, but this is the fifth morning in a row they've come over at exactly 9. They stay all day, up there in his room. I don't know what they're doing. I don't want to know."  
  
Irene looked up from her apple and raised a quizzical eyebrow.   
  
"I'm sure they're just having fun playing nurse," Molly said, barely able to suppress a laugh. Irene let out a quick derisive snort.

"Yeah, _porn_ nurse."  
  
Molly put on a breathy voice: "It's _my_ turn to take your temperature now!"  
  
"And then you can take mine, with _your_ thermometer!"  
  
Molly wrinkled her nose and exclaimed, "Gross!" They dissolved into schoolgirl giggles until Molly's still-tender sides complained, and she stopped first, gasping, "That is so bad."  
  
"I know!" Irene agreed in an exaggeratedly deadpan tone. "I'm sure they're very nice girls." She couldn't seem to keep her eyes from rolling, though, which only sent them both into another fit of laughter. This time Irene stopped first, and asked, "Seriously, though, aren't you a little concerned about what's going on up there?"  
  
"You know, I'm really not. Jack's a smart kid, and he's responsible. I trust him to do the right thing, and to know what the right thing is. And if he decides that polyamory is his thing, well, why the hell not? How long can it last, anyway?"  
  
"That's a very enlightened point of view you're taking there," Irene pointed out, returning to her apple-peeling.  
  
"Yeah, well, I'm trying to learn to take things the way they are. Live in the now. I'm trying not to freak out over the small things anymore, you know?"  
  
Irene didn't respond, instead glancing contemplatively at Molly for a long time before saying in a tone that was barely audible, "Yeah, I guess mine's pretty smart, too."  
  
It was Molly's turn to raise an eyebrow as she looked up from her apple-slicing and tried not to let the unmitigated dread that was stabbing its talons into her stomach bleed through to her facial expression.  
  
Irene finally met her gaze. "Well, why the hell not? How long can it last, anyway?" She shrugged and after a moment of silence, laughed awkwardly to fill the gap. But it died quickly and she bit back a thousand different possible things to say in the space of thirty seconds, until Molly mercifully spoke up again.  
  
"Life is so strange, you know?" She pushed the blade of the knife through the diminishing remains of the original apple, shoving it toward the cutting board, underscoring her words with a nervous chopping beat. "Nothing just happens the way it's supposed to happen. I think you and Ned are the only people I know who are happy and in love and normal."   
  
Irene didn't look up, but considered that rather uncharacteristically imperceptive assertion while she pulled the remaining skin from the apple with her nails, digging deeper each time. Finally: "You know, I think the problem is that none of us can just come out and say, 'This is what I want, and you all can learn to live with it.' Not even me." She smiled ruefully and slid off the chair. Before Molly could consider the meaning of that peculiar declaration, Irene placed the peeled apple in front of her and brushed a hand across her shoulder before heading toward the door again.   
  
"I've got to go fill up the refrigerator in preparation for the inevitable return of my sons to the nest. See you later." She paused. "It's good that you're doing better." And then she was gone, again leaving the door slightly open. After a moment, Molly could hear the car door slam and the engine growl, and then nothing. She was a little troubled by their conversation, but her thoughts to that end slipped away when Carey entered tentatively through the door his mother had left open.   
  
She looked down at the table, unsure of what to say now. So he spoke first.  
  
"I heard what you said, about letting things happen. I'm impressed."  
  
"So am I," she admitted. He sat down in the opposite chair. She stopped slicing and pushed the rather thin apple slices away. "Of course, I can't promise that I'll actually do that."  
  
"I know," he said simply, and reached out to cover her free hand with his. She wasn't sure just what she was getting herself into, but she figured that maybe for now it might be okay to go with it and let something good just happen while it was still around to offer itself to her. After all, why not? How long could it last? She smiled and set down the knife.


	14. XIV

Clu, meanwhile, had entered through the front door, which Molly had also left unlocked in anticipation of their visit. He headed upstairs slowly, the gears in his brain working overtime every step of the way. He rehearsed his speech: he would say that he was sorry about what happened between them in the car that night because he had only done it because he wanted someone else that he couldn't really have. But he would explain that he was reconsidering what he wanted now.   
  
He and Jack had come to a mutual agreement to be friends for now, until they could deal with what might happen if someone found out about them, and therefore that they would both be open to other possibilities. Of course, Jack probably hadn't meant for Clu to go after his sister right away, but Clu hadn't meant for Jack to go out and get himself two new girlfriends, either.   
  
After disembarking from this particular thought train, Clu found himself suddenly at Fi's door. He could hear the busy clacking of the keyboard from within the room and took a deep breath. He knocked lightly and then opened the door.  
  
Fi normally hated it when people did that, because what's the point of knocking if you don't wait for somebody to answer? But the crankiness quickly faded when she saw him, and she greeted him enthusiastically. "Clu!" She closed the laptop with an abrupt snap.  
  
"Fi!" he said with equal enthusiasm, offering his trademark goofy smile. "You find out what was up with that monster thing yet?"  
  
"No," she said, her expression briefly darkening. "Even my online friends think I'm crazy this time."  
  
He looked concerned and sat down on the bed next to her. "But your mom and Jack--"  
  
"Have convinced themselves that it was a case of mass hysteria brought on by exhaustion from the end of the tour, or something. I don't know. I don't care. To tell you the truth, I'm just glad it's gone. We've never really come up against anything like that before."  
  
Clu nodded along with her last few words, and then laughed awkwardly.   
  
"Speaking of it being gone, you know, I never really got a chance to thank you for what you did."  
  
He made a show of waiting, lifting one ear in her direction.  
  
"So, thank you."  
  
He smiled again. "Well, it was nothing really."  
  
There was a moment of silence that passed between them as he tried to figure out just how to start that whole speech he'd been practicing on the stairs. She beat him to it.  
  
"Um, about what happened that night in the car, you know, we never really got a chance to talk about it."  
  
"Oh, don't--"  
  
"No," she interrupted firmly. "I wanted to say that I'm sorry I went out there with you just because I wanted somebody else that I couldn't really have."  
  
"Oh," said Clu, a little embarrassed. "You don't have to--"  
  
"But I'm reconsidering what I want now, you know? After everything that's happened. And I think I think there could be something here. I know you and my brother are--"  
  
It was Clu's turn to interrupt. "No," he said. "Not anymore."  
  
"Oh. That's too bad. Do you want to talk about it?"  
  
"Not with you," he laughed, before it occurred to him that maybe that wasn't exactly the right thing to say.  
  
"Good," she said, more than a little relieved. "So"  
  
"So I think we should take it slow and see if anything happens."   
  
Clu smiled. "Exactly. It's like you read my mind."  
  
"I read about that!" she exclaimed. "After a traumatic incident, sometimes people pick up certain abilities, and one of them is the ability to read people's minds!" 

She snapped the laptop open again and began typing. Clu leaned back against the wall beside her and closed his eyes, listening to the rapid clicking of her fingers against the keys. He had a feeling he'd find himself in this position a lot in the days to come  



	15. it's all over now

AN: This is the last chapter. Thanks for reading, and especially to those who reviewed too. :)  


It was considerably later that evening when Fi finally emerged from her room, long after Clu had gotten hungry and decided to go home. Jack also emerged, looking oddly refreshed, though his companions had also left earlier. They met wordlessly in the hallway and hobbled downstairs together, where they found Molly, sitting alone in the living room, staring at the empty fireplace. Jack presumed she was doing what she seemed to like most besides performing, which was pining for her dear departed husband, but Fi knew better.

Things had been rather strained between them since their return from the hospital. Fi was, of course, glad to see that her mother was physically fine after what had happened, but every time she began to think too fondly of her or be too grateful that she was still alive and well, what had been easy to forget under duress kept whispering its secrets into her ears and making it quite difficult to speak to Molly civilly at all. So she hadn't. She'd stayed in her room, discussing the events of the past couple of weeks with the only people she knew who weren't trying to convince her that it wasn't really what it really was, anonymous screen names in small boxes that littered her screen eagerly every time she lifted the lid of the laptop. 

Jack limped into the living room and sat down ungracefully on one of the couches. Molly looked up, almost startled by their sudden presence in the room. Fi lingered by the door before stepping inside tentatively. Even then, she didn't sit. She stood by the fireplace with her back turned to the others. She wondered whether, if her father had survived, her life might be completely different at this particular moment. 

Her mother, certainly, wouldn't be having an affair with the boy she had spent her childhood admiring silently. Her brother would probably also not be her new semi-boyfriend's ex-semi-boyfriend, either. Whether they would still have spent the last two weeks being hunted and hunting an invisible monster, however, was difficult to determine. To think about the whole thing in such plain terms made it all sound so silly and trashy, almost. Apparently all of them needed to get out of the house much more often. Well, regardless of how it might have been, this is how it was, and of course she was just going to have to live with that. The Jack thing didn't bother her nearly so much as the other, actually. 

"So, Jack," said Molly, effectively breaking Fi's concentration. "How are Chelsea and Rhonda?"

"Oh, you know," he said noncommittally. "Fine. The usual."

"You've seen a lot more of them than usual lately," she noted.

"Yeah, you know how girls are."

Molly tried not to laugh. Jack seemed easily embarrassed by this line of rather soft questioning, and decided to limp into the kitchen and occupy himself otherwise. That left Fi alone with her, and she briefly considered simply walking away, going back into her room and locking the door, spending another night relating to strangers instead of facing her rather complicated real-life situation. It was an attractive solution to the problem that had suddenly presented itself, but she decided to take a cue from Clu and be braver than usual, so she sat down in the seat Jack had vacated.

"So," she said.

"So," agreed Molly.

"How are you feeling?" 

"Better. So are you?"

"Yeah."

"Anything interesting on the web these days?"

"Oh, you know," she said noncommittally. "The usual."

Molly was too tired to continue being sensitive. "Is something bothering you?"

Well, there were only two answers Fi could possibly give to that question, one of which would be accurate and the other of which would be less so. But the former would lead to more conversation about an unappealing subject, whereas the latter would lead to a nice quiet evening. She deliberated too long.

"I take it that's a yes. What's wrong? I saw Clu leave earlier. I didn't even know he had come over. Is something going on between you?"

"Well, yeah," Fi answered, a little taken aback by the sudden barrage of assertions and questions. "But that's not--that isn't what's bothering me."

"Okay," Molly said slowly.

"I... you know, I, Carey and I had--we had a talk before." Since when did she have such a problem with forming coherent sentences?

"Oh," said Molly. Great. It had never been clear to her which might be worse, Irene and Ned finding out, or Fi and Jack finding out. They were both equally dreadful options. She asked carefully, "Does your brother know?"

"No, he's been a little busy with his own problems."

"Oh?" This was a surprise.

"Yeah, it's... it's all resolved now, and everything, though."

"Well, that's good, I guess." Long pause. "So... you want to talk about it?"

"Not really."

"Good," she said, clearly relieved. 

"This isn't something we can just tie up with a pretty little bow, you know," said Fi, going on the defense a bit prematurely.

"Of course."

"I don't like it."

"I didn't think you would."

"I don't think it's a good idea."

"Neither do I."

"I don't ever, ever, ever want to hear about it unless you're telling me that it's over between you."

"I understand."

"I don't even want to think about it."

"Okay."

"It's not going to last forever, you know."

"I know."

"Okay."

"Okay." Molly smiled at her. Fi shook her head and swallowed all the questions that were trying to force their way up from her throat, because she knew she'd never want to hear the answers. After a while, she smiled too, and decided to leave the laptop alone for the evening. Jack eventually returned and sat next to Fi. Molly decided not to ask him any more leading questions about his girlfriends. Fi decided not to tell him about Carey or Clu. There was, after all, a good reason why such things were referred to as one's private life. And so they spent a lovely unspoiled evening together in the living room, staring into the empty fireplace, avoiding touchy subjects, including romantic entanglements and the improbability of recent events being attributable to simple mass hysteria or a shared hallucination. 

It occurred to Fi much later, after the others had dropped into sleep, while in her own drowsy haze, that although it was certainly possible that the Drac had retreated to wherever because it was missing its tail, perhaps it had more to do with certain people learning to let go of certain hang-ups, which would have made them less attractive to the monster seeking to punish those ruled by anger or fear like his own tormentors so long ago. She almost laughed at the absurdity of that idea, but then again, in this strange universe, it really wasn't impossible. At least she had some kind of semi-plausible explanation to offer her remaining fellow believers now...


End file.
